Never whole and doomed to die
by Meep meep
Summary: It is not my heart that is missing, I can still feel it inside me. But, like the rest of me, it is a cold, dead thing. This war is the final string in the noose around my neck...'
1. Fortunes Fool

_Disclaimer: These characters (or rather, character) do NOT belong to me. If you haven't gotten that before now, you need to reread the books._

_Dedication: to my best friends, you know who you are, who help to make this sorry world a place worth living in. I love you all._

Some people believe they are immortal. People die, but not them. I know I'm going to die, I accept that it isn't a matter of if, but of when and how. I know this all already.

For years I've been dying. Metaphorically, of course. I've been dying for so long that I can't remember when I lived. When I was truly alive. I suppose there must have been a time when that was the case, but I don't recall.

Those years have been shrouded by the pain and horror of the following moments. At times, I think that's all that's kept me alive, the pain. I could have ended it years ago. I could have finished this, but I didn't.

I walked away and I am now lost to this cause. This fool's errand is the reason I gave my life. I gave this pathetic excuse for a life up for a cause I know nothing about.

I tried to think of this as anything other than what it is, but it is only a worthless cause. I didn't need to do this, but I did, and now I'm a lamb to the slaughter of either side that wants me. I was thrown to the lions a long time ago.

I believe that there is no escape for me. No escape for any of this. No one can escape this war. I say war, but really it is no war. It is a massacre. No one will survive this, not whole. But that is not a worry for me – I was never whole in the first place. There was always something missing in me. Many believe it to be my heart.

It is not my heart that is missing, I can still feel it inside me. But, like the rest of me, it is a cold, dead thing.

This war is only the final string in the noose around my neck. A noose that tightens every moment I remain breathing. Each beat of my blackened heart twists the dagger that lies in it.

Some days I wish for an end. Any end. The war, this endless try for peace, or as much peace as possible. My end.

But even if an end came, would anyone care? No, they would not. I am a fence-straddler, inadvertently helping and hindering both sides at once. And the fence I perch upon is sharp and high, and every day puts me dangerously closer to the edge. One day I will fall, but not today. No, not today.

And so it is that I am here, left for dead, miles away from my home, but not safe. Nowhere is safe for such as I.

Am I death-eater or shining light? A spy or a traitor? Even I do not truly know. This all started with good intentions. But morals and kind-nature did not save me. Nothing can save me. And even if it could, no one would want it to.

I am a hated man, doomed to die. I am sworn to death no matter what I choose. But aren't we all? From the moment we are conceived we are destined to die. It is not a matter of if, but of when and how. So I fight this war, live this life and try to survive. Try to do the right thing.

Isn't it ironic, me doing the right thing? I am fortunes fool, and life is nothing if not ironic.

So I shall try to do my part for this war. Me and my cold, dead heart.

_Guessed who? Review and tell me!_


	2. Losing Faith

_AN: for the people who haven't yet guessed, this is Snape talking in the fic._

Who am I to you? Better yet, who am I to me? Am I the traitor, the killer, the beast? Or am I the rebel, spy and teacher? Either/or. Straddling the fence when it's about to be blown out from under me. Which side will I land on? Who will I choose to be?

Am I a visionary, fighting this war for a long-forgotten cause? Or am I the foolish boy who was stupid enough to give his life as sacrifice on the whim of another?

Because I have given my life, I've given up everything I stood for and everything I ever hoped to be for this war.

That boy, he is not the only one standing in His way. He is only a pawn in the game, standing among a great many other pawns, trying their hardest to stop the opposing side. I do my best to try and stop Him, to stand in His way, but sometimes that just isn't enough. I am the leader of a rebel group who have never been, and will never be, heard of. Grand leader of a suicide group, because that's what it is to play a part in this war. Not one member will survive this, but we already knew that. Besides, who out there would want us to?

Am I fighting for a cause or am I just an assassin? A mindless, heartless killer who is always waiting, always ready for the next kill.

I am not heartless – I am not the Ice King they perceive me to be. I feel, I feel too much. Pain and misery. Agony, heartache, rage. I can't remember ever feeling happiness, and I doubt there will be any occasion for it in the near future.

The 'Ice King' they call me, for if Draco is Prince then I am surely King. But my frozen heart still beats, heavy and tired in my chest. But it still beats. And there are still people, too many people, who are out there blind to the suffering of others. Some see, but do not care. I see, and I care. I care that people are suffering, that people are dying for this war. I care.

I fight for a boy I don't even pretend to know, saving the lives of people I have never, and probably _will_ never meet. I'll die protecting people I mean absolutely nothing to. If that isn't care enough then what is?

But one day we all die anyway. It's just a matter of how soon.

I am a lost cause, lost to the world, lost to everything. I am unable to hope or dream – there is only harsh reality to be found here. A harsh and bitter truth.

I envy you your optimism – for you there is still hope, still a little beauty to be found in this world. Still a belief in a world better than this, a world after the war.

And that is what I fight for, what I strive towards. An end to the war and a future better than this.

I won't be a part of that future, and my line will die out with me. So I do not fight for me and mine. I fight for someone out there, somewhere, who will still be alive by the end. And when I die, so too will everyone I care about. Dying for a dream.

So tell me again, what I am. I am a fool, no doubt about that. The foolish sacrifice, standing on the edge at the very end, fighting for a dream I don't believe can ever exist.


	3. Protege moi

They said that I would never regret my decision to join them. How incredibly wrong they were, because I do regret it. I regret it every day I remain breathing. I think I may even still regret it when I cease to breathe.

People have ideas of how they perceive the afterlife will be – Heaven, Hell, reincarnation, whatever – it's all just another idea, another thought to try to give life a real meaning. People can spend their whole life preparing for Heaven and never doing anything with their life. I fail to see why people need a meaning other than the one they have here – fight the war, try to survive. And if I survive this war, then it will be because I won at the game, not because some false god made it so. Not because my parents raised me right, not because my teachers taught me well, not because I ha the right friends, but because I won the game.

Because I survived when the odds were against me, because I could survive on my own, I may yet live and win the game. The game of life or death. The game that we all must learn to play. That we all must learn to win.

But I hold my doubts on the matter of my winning. To be here an extra day is just another day of looking over your shoulder and praying they don't find you.

Another day of hoping that when they do find you, they don't do their worst to make you sorry. For I have a lot to be sorry for, more so than most. Hope you can win the game.

For each of us pretends that it is just a game. That they are just toy soldiers we send off to war, just toy soldiers. For toy soldiers have no family, no feelings, no one to care if they get lost.

And when we see the people lying facedown in grass dyed red with blood, we pretend that they are just broken dolls. Broken dolls littering a child's bedroom, not actual people, not actually formerly alive. Just dolls, made purely out of cold plastic, not the shells of people we might've known, not people we might've loved.

And we pretend that they have lost the game, a game that we ourselves will no doubt win. We pretend that we don't know their names, though their names and faces haunt our dreams for the rest of our lives. We hide the fact that every action we perform is tainted by the faces of the dead, knowing that they will never again perform such actions as these. Hide that we know that we should have died that day, that we know that we are the ones who have lost the game – for we have not won the only prize that life could have given us. Hide the fact that the only thing we want is to die, whereas the others – all they wanted was to live.

And so we pass the days, screaming out for others to save us, to protect us – without ever saying a word. Protégé-moi, protégé-moi. And in reply, we get death and fear and the horridly overpowering scent of cinnamon and honeysuckle, the trace scent of death.

But the scent clouds other smells, for which I am grateful, such as the burnt coffee and ammonia of fear, and the lingering smell of urine that seems to cling to battlefields no matter how many years its been since they were fought on.

So the fighters make-believe that they have no regrets, no fears. They make-believe that one day they will wake up from this abhorrent simile of a nightmare, but one day never comes, and they are left with the one day that they don't wake up at all. And we hope that when that day comes it will be quick and easy, unless we are the kind of fools who wish to die a glorious death that writes itself into history. But I think the war has rid of fools such as these.

But there is no make-believe that can eliminate the reality for one such as I. There is nothing to hide behind, nothing left to disguise the painful reminder that all is not a happy ending.

And so my life now is spent remembering the things that I regret, and looking over my shoulder in the hope that they are not behind me.


	4. Our Father's War

There are enough people out there who care enough to follow me, even to here. As far as I run, there will always be a sympathiser of His or of Dumbledore's that will follow me to hell. For that is surely where I am headed. Hell, or whatever equivalent your ideas and beliefs have.

And they follow me, even though there is an ongoing war, even though people are dying wherever I go. Even though this war will kill us all if it does not stop right now.

A moment passes, and another, and another – another moment that we are running from them, running through the maze of the world, through the mazes in my mind, trying to get far enough away to rest. Just for a day, an hour even, just a rest.

But I suppose the only rest I'll ever get will be when I die. And hopefully, after I've done my bit to end this war, it will come soon and be over quickly. Not that I deserve the peace. Not that I don't deserve the pain.

But of course, as always, such things as these are not up to me. If they had been up to me, Tom Riddle would have been drowned at birth, and then we could have had a little longer to live happily, without looking over our shoulders for the enemy.

Every person in this place is an enemy, because for those such as me there is no concept of friendship. Nor happiness, for my life was destined to take a different route. The long, hard path of toil and horror, never ending on its journey through hell.

The paths each of us must take are winding and they all lead to the same place, some fraught with strife and hardship, some not. All headed down the route of inescapable war.

Ah, the war. It governs the lives of each and every one of us, the focal point around which our feelings and our actions develop. It will come upon us and destroy everything it touches, reaching at us, grabbing at us and chewing our heads until there is nothing left for it to chew on. And then it will rampage through the remains of the dead, dancing on the graves and tearing holes in the world.

And without the boy, there will be nothing we can do to stop it. Even with the boy, we have to be prepared for him to change and fall apart after the war is through. We send them out while they are still so young, and they see things that some adults will never see, horrors that burn themselves into their brains, and then we are unprepared for the breakdown that is bound to follow, and we try to sweep it under the carpet.

And they become monsters, twisted effigies of the demons they are fighting within their minds. And then they become parents and change and twist their children. And so the cycle begins again – a new war, a new hero, a new bitter ending for all involved.

And, as always, I should know.

But there are some things that no one, not even myself, should know, should be subjected to. And veterans of the war of our fathers, is one of those things.

But sadly, should and should not know do not play into it. It is merely the hand that life throws to us, the hand that must be dealt to someone.

And everyone else is just collateral. Just another card that life threw our way, just another damaged soul, courtesy of the war we fight, both inside us and out.

A war our fathers gave us.


End file.
